Revised: 24 June 2004; 18 July 2005;
28 March 2006; 12 November 2008;
2 February 2009

PREFACE

This document contains information about editorial practice
for the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (TGN)®,
one of the vocabularies produced by the Getty Vocabulary Program.
The other two vocabularies are the Art & Architecture
Thesaurus (AAT)® and the Union List of Artist Names
(ULAN)®. NOTE: The guidelines in this document
are subject to frequent modification and addition.

Purpose of these guidelines
This document contains rules and guidelines intended for use
by the editors of the Getty Vocabulary Program using the in-house
editorial system, VCS (Vocabulary Coordination System). Contributors
to the Getty Vocabularies and implementers of the licensed
vocabulary data may consult these guidelines as well. However,
contributors and implementers should keep in mind that they
must extrapolate information and guidance appropriate for
their own needs and uses.

Purpose of the TGNThe TGN, AAT, and ULAN are structured vocabularies that
can be used to improve access to information about art, architecture,
and material culture.

They may be used as data value standards at the point
of documentation or cataloging. In this context, they may
be used as a controlled vocabulary or authority. They provide
preferred terms (or descriptors) for concepts, as
well as other synonyms that could be used by the cataloger
or indexer. They also provide structure and classification
schemes that can aid in documentation.

They may be used as search assistants in database retrieval
systems, taking advantage of the semantic networks of links
and paths between concepts; these relationships can make
retrieval more successful.

They may be utilized as research tools, valuable because
of the rich information and contextual knowledge that they
contain.

Focus
The focus of each of the Getty vocabularies is art, architecture,
and material culture. The vocabularies provide terminology
and other information about the objects, concepts, artists,
and places important to various disciplines that specialize
in these subjects. The primary users of the Getty vocabularies
include museums, art libraries, archives, visual resource
collection catalogers, bibliographic projects concerned with
art, researchers in art and art history, and the information
specialists who are dealing with the needs of these users.
In addition, a significant number of users of the Getty vocabularies
are students and members of the general public.

Contributors
TGN is a compiled resource; it is not comprehensive. It grows
over time to become gradually more comprehensive, to reflect
changes in the current political world, and to accommodate
new research in art history and archaeology. The TGN grows
through contributions. Information in the TGN was compiled
by the Getty Vocabulary Program in collaboration with many
institutions. Institutions interested in becoming contributors
to the TGN may write to vocab@getty.edu, explaining the scope
of their collections and likely contributions.

Scope of the TGN
The TGN is a structured vocabulary currently containing around
1,106,000 names and other information about places. Names
for a place may include names in the vernacular language,
English, other languages, historical names, and names in natural
order and inverted order. Among these names, one is flagged
as the preferred name.

1.1.1.2

Structure of the data
The focus of each TGN record is a place. There are around
912,000 places in the TGN. In the database, each place record
(also called a subject in this manual) is identified
by a unique numeric ID. Linked to the record for the place
are names, the place's parent or position in the hierarchy,
other relationships, geographic coordinates, notes, sources
for the data, and place types, which are terms describing
the role of the place (e.g., inhabited place and state
capital). The temporal coverage of the TGN ranges from
prehistory to the present and the scope is global.

The TGN is a hierarchical database; its trees branch
from a root called Top of the TGN hierarchies (Subject_ID:
1000000); it currently has two published facets, World
and Extraterrestrial Places. Under the World,
the places are generally arranged in hierarchies representing
the current political and physical world, although some
historical nations and empires are also included. There
may be multiple broader contexts, making the TGN polyhierarchical.
In addition to the hierarchical relationships, the TGN has
equivalent and associative relationships; thus it is a thesaurus,
in compliance with ISO and NISO standards.

Unpublished facets in TGN are used for candidate records.
Unpublished facets and hierarchies are designated by the
"name" temp.parent (e.g., temp.parent/candidate
records).

1.1.2

What is a Thesaurus?

The TGN is a thesaurus. A thesaurus is a semantic
network of unique concepts, including relationships between
synonyms, broader and narrower (parent/child) contexts,
and other related concepts. Thesauri allow three types of
relationships: equivalence (synonym), hierarchical (whole/part
or genus/species), and associative. Thesauri may be monolingual
or multilingual. Most fields in TGN records are written
in English. While the TGN is not fully multilingual strictly
speaking, the structure of the TGN supports multilinguality
insofar as names and scope notes may be written and flagged
in multiple languages. Thesauri are used to ensure consistency
in indexing and to facilitate the retrieval of information.

1.1.2.1

Relationships
Thesauri may have the following three relationships:

1.1.2.1.1

Equivalence relationships
The relationships between synonymous terms or names for the
same concept, typically distinguishing preferred terms (descriptors)
and non-preferred terms (variants).

1.1.2.1.2

Hierarchical relationships
Broader and narrower (parent/child) relationships between
concepts. Hierarchical relationships are generally either
whole/part or genus/species; in the TGN, most hierarchical
relationships are whole/part (e.g., California is part
of the United States). Relationships may be polyhierarchical,
meaning that each child may be linked to multiple parents
(e.g., Hawaii is part of the United States and
also part of Oceania).

1.1.2.1.3

Associative relationships
The relationships between concepts that are closely related
conceptually, but the relationship is not hierarchical because
it is not whole/part or genus/species.

1.1.3

What is a Geographic Place?

In the context of the TGN, a geographic place is an administrative
entity or a physical feature that has a proper name, is
of the type recorded in atlases and gazetteers, and is required
for cataloging art and architecture.

1.1.3.1

Political and Administrative Bodies Administrative entities are political and administrative
bodies are defined by administrative boundaries and conditions,
including inhabited places, nations, empires, nations, states,
districts, and townships. Administrative entities include
those defined by boundaries set up by standard, independent
sovereign states. In addition, administrative entities in
the TGN may include those with government and boundaries defined
by ecclesiastical or tribal authorities. TGN may include former
administrative entities, such as historical kingdoms or deserted
settlements.

Examples

primary political unit

dependent state

autonomous municipality

nation

federation

independent sovereign nation

empire

first level subdivision

country

bailiwick

kingdom

canton

city-state

special city

colony

commissary

commonwealth

metropolitan area

independent city

county

department

dependency

parish (political)

province

region

shire

state

territory

external territory

unincorporated territory

overseas territory

possession

occupied territory

second level subdivision

diocese

archdiocese

parish (ecclesiastical)

arrondissement

third level subdivision

borough

precinct

township

inhabited place

locale

rural community

hamlet

village

American Indian reservation

city

town

Aboriginal reserve

1.1.3.2

Physical Features Physical features are characteristics of the Earth's
surface that have been shaped by natural forces, including
continents, mountains, forests, rivers, and oceans. They do
not include man-made features, such as roads, reservoirs,
or canals.

Examples

ocean

pond

river

creek

lakes

lake

intermittent lake

bay

strait

glacier

river mouth

waterfall

desert

oasis

wetland

marsh

continent

subcontinent

fault

volcano

dunes

arroyo

canyon

fluvial island

mountain

mountain range

mountain system

hill

hills

plateau

valley

basin

field

plain

cape

island group

island

peninsula

reef

shore

cave

crater

depression

pampa

prairie

savanna

jungle

forest

1.1.3.2.1

Extraterrestrial places
A small number of extraterrestrial places are included in
TGN.

1.1.3.3

Places that no longer exist
The TGN may include places that are no longer extant. This
includes deserted settlements, historical states, and lost
physical features, such as submerged islands.

What is excluded from TGN?
Smaller features typically found within the boundaries of
a city are generally not included in TGN. Typically excluded
from TGN are buildings, landmarks, and streets within cities, although certain large features may be included.
Also excluded are mythical places, such as the Garden of Eden.
Lost sites may be included if they are generally believed
to have existed, even if their precise historical location
is not currently known.

1.1.3.4.1

Built works
In general, architectural works are outside the scope of the
TGN. Buildings are occasionally included in the TGN, but these
are limited to structures that are located in the countryside
(for example, abbeys, villas, and shopping centers), where
they serve as a place name in the absence of a larger
populated place. Certain other large, major man-made features
are also included in TGN, for example the Great Wall of
China and the Appian Way. Large, major examples of landscape architecture may be included if they are used as a place name, such as Central Park in New York City.

1.1.3.4.2

Cultural and political groups
Cultural and Political groups are outside the scope of the
TGN. However, the political state of a cultural or political
group, and the territory within its boundaries may be included
in the TGN. For example, the Ottoman Turks are outside
the scope of the TGN, although the Ottoman Empire could
be included.

1.2

Editorial control

1.2.1

Review process

Records are created and edited by the Vocabulary Program
editors and trained, established contributors, following
the Editorial Rules laid out in this manual.

As time permits, the Vocabulary Program reviews individual
records from contributors before they are released in the
TGN. All contributions are checked, however less supervision
is required for trained, established contributors.

Vocabulary Program (VP) editors follow strict rules when
adding new records to the TGN. VP editors edit the contributors'
records to comply with VP policy and practice; however,
given the large number of records in the TGN, editors do
not have the time or resources to edit every record. An
editorial goal is to have uniform and homogeneous records
throughout the TGN, but employing flexible standards for
contributors' data means that the TGN database as whole
is not entirely consistent or totally uniform.

The VP collects new issues that arise during the course
of accepting contributions and editing the TGN. The resolutions
of these issues are periodically transferred to an updated
version of the manual.

1.2.2

Does contributors' data follow editorial
rules?

The Vocabulary Program communicates with and trains potential
contributors, to assure that 1) the incoming data will be
within the scope of the TGN, and 2) the incoming data will
be in an appropriate format and generally consistent with
the TGN standards.

Given that the TGN is compiled from various contributors'
automated records, it is necessary to allow "flexible
standards" in order to accept contributions from a
wide variety of institutions with established, diverse practice.
Compliance with the critical standards regarding technical
rules, structure, content, and editorial guidelines is required;
however, certain other content and editorial guidelines
are considered non-critical and are therefore not strictly
enforced for some contributors. For example, it is critical
that all records are in a format that can be imported into
the TGN and include the required fields. It is also critical
that the required fields are indexed or formatted in a way
that will allow retrieval. However, it is not critical that
the preferred name in a non-Roman alphabet be transliterated
using an ISO standard (although this is highly recommended)
or that the descriptive note be phrased according to a uniform
style (although this is recommended too).

1.3

Releasing the Data

1.3.1

Web browsers

Data is released to the online Web versions of the TGN,
AAT, and ULAN monthly, on or near the first of the month.
Data for the release is taken during the third or fourth
week of the preceding month.

1.3.2

Licensed files

Data in formats available for licensing is released annually
in June. The TGN data is released in two formats: relational
tables and XML. ULAN and AAT are also released in the MARC
format. TGN editors clean the data as well as possible prior
to each annual release.

1.4

Vocabulary Coordination System (VCS)

VCS is the editorial system used to house and edit the
three Getty Vocabularies. Each vocabulary is stored in a
separate iteration of VCS. References to "the system"
refer to VCS. References made to "fields" refer
to data elements in VCS. References to a "record"
or "subject record" refer to an intellectual record
comprising all the data linked to a given Subject ID in
the data structure.

1.4.1

Database

VCS uses a relational database; the database models for
each of the three vocabularies are identical in most ways,
differing only where necessary. See the Data Dictionary
for further information.

1.4.2

Merged Records

The TGN is compiled from place names and other geographic
information that has been collected by the Getty and other
institutions. When multiple contributors have submitted
information about the same place, all the names and information
about this Place should be merged into a single record ("merge"
is a function of the VCS editorial system).

1.4.3

Operating VCS

The chapters in this manual contain definitions of the
fields, suggested values, sources where the values may be
found, and rules for entering the data where relevant. The
fields are presented roughly in the order in which they
are found in VCS.

While there is some mention of the functionality of VCS
in this manual, detailed instructions for the system are
not included here. Instructions regarding how to use VCS
are provided during training.

Last updated 18 January 2011
Document is subject to frequent revisions